1st Build WandererTJ's Mjolnir Mk. V (Custom) - S-128 - [Hybrid Build] [Pic Heavy]

[WandererTJ]

Amazing work and write ups WandererTJ. Seen the suit all on instagram but never knew how the suit actually came to be. Awesome job with the upholstery foam. I never knew it had so much versatility. Is it easy to seal using spray on sealant like leak seal or plastidip(for upholstery foam)?

No it's a total pain! But only in the fact that you need A LOT of sealant to basically drown it.

Amazing work, WandererTJ! I am super duper jealous! Looks superb!

Thanks bro, I definitely appreciate it!

 

[WandererTJ]

I've gone back and added some more details to yesterday's posts, but I'm honestly not sure that I'd say I'm done with them.

Belt/Cod/Tail Plate:​

Let's learn from our mistakes, let's learn from our mistakes, let's learn from our mistakes.
We're not going to pour hours into something scaled wrong again.

So what did I do?
I took the low poly geometry that was the game models, and then modeled the inside faces, the parts that touch the body that everything sticks out from. And then I only used those inside faces.
Glue? Nah, packing tape, it's all I needed to confirm that it was close enough.
If you want to go for a super speed build, honestly you might be able to get away with just doing this if you add a few details here and there.


Rough Draft Pics:

I believe these photos were done before I fitted the Corset better.
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When I finally made it to the official version, it did end up a little big, but I was fortunate to "only" have to tailor off 1.5" from the rear side panels.
Again, Armorsmith was great for ballparking measurements, but not great for getting things actually precise. It's really great at proportionating things and getting the length of everything, I think it just needs to grow as far as thicknesses are concerned.

So even though I did make a roughdraft, it wasn't enough.

I've seen a lot of builds skip out on geometry on the Belt/Cod, just like with the stomach piece, and I wanted to set a new bar for it.
I've done my best to capture all the angles inside and outside to help others who come by.
White = 5mm, Red = 3mm, Grey = 3/8".

This was like 10% templates and like 90% freehand.
Unlike with the rest of the armor, this one really felt like I was freehanding a lot more of it. There are SO many details left out of the game model that they just tossed into the texture file. That includes the entire recessed sections at the front and the rear of the belt that lead into the cod piece and butt plate.
Really ought to do side by sides with the game models, textures, and in-game references, because the #detailporn is here.

I'll also say it right now, you can do better than I did with the butt plate, the two upper structures on it can be built out a bit and be given more depth.

The belt attaches in the back with buckles. It secures to me via velcro in on the sides of the undersuit.
Straps on both sides? Okay, not exactly necessary, but 1) symmetry and 2) when you gotta go, you gotta go, I don't care what side I can reach quicker if I gotta pee.

I regret not reinforcing it more on the inside, because with the 5mm foam, I've gotten some bad flexing in the paint from it flapping around when I take it off.

I'm not actually wearing any of it in these pics.
The butt plate is sitting a little weird in these photos, but look better when its actually being worn.

Progress Pics:

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Model Used:
A mix of the game file and some other files, with a lot of free handing.
I also didn't have access to a printer for some of it, so I traced templates from my screen. Not fun, wouldn't recommend.

References:

Credit: Ruze789​

 

[WandererTJ]

Gloves and Paint Test​

I previously covered my handplates in this post: http://www.405th.com/showthread.php?t=44695&p=734227&viewfull=1#post734227

I used the typical Rap4 gloves for my base.
I modified the gloves to my liking by taking a Dremel to the logo on the wrist strap and grinding it away.
I also cut out sections of the plastic on the back of the hand, because I felt that otherwise the handplates sat out too far.

Pictures:

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Paint Discussion:
The handplates were initially coated a few times with plastidip.
Krylon Brilliant Aluminum was used for the silver.
Rustoleum High Performance Enamel for Black
Krylon's Italian Olive was used for the green.
I used latex between coats so that I could later tear it away.
I used some crappy black acrylic for black washing.
I dry brushed some silver acrylic for all the scratches.
Clear coated with Duplicolor's Matte Wheel Clearcoat from O'Reilly's/Autozone.

Since your hands tend to hit and brush on things a lot, I decided to go very heavy with the weathering on these.

 

[WandererTJ]

Initial Paint Pass and First Suit Up​

Progress Pics (Part 1):
I'm realizing I haven't really touched on filling gaps or seams all that much even though I should have a dedicated post to it.
I did it in several passes, each one waiting 2+ hours. I noted that the caulking seems to settle, so even when it looks filled in, you may have to add more later. I haven't mastered it yet, as I'm still struggling to get perfect transitions between my seams and the foam surface.

In the first batch of pics here, you'll see some Plastidip, the first go of Silver, and some applying of the latex for later weathering.

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First Suit Up:
The video cuts out at 3:18 due to a power loss of the recording device.
What you miss is the torso being put on. The handler has to reach into the upper and lower front sides of the armpits and connect 4 total buckles.

Big note here: I added a very large band across the top of the ab wrap, effectively turning it into a corset, which I will stand by and continue to call it.
This is definitely the best way to not let anyone see any visible seams or gaps in your armor.

Progress Pics (Part 2):
Here you can see some of the initial color.
I discovered one thing while painting the CQC shoulder, and it turns out "dremel smooth" is very much not smooth. If you have surfaces you dremeled, you will likely need to take some caulking and apply a coat to the surface.

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Paints Used:
Silver - Krylon Brilliant Aluminum
Black - Rustoleum High Performance Enamel
Green - Krylon's Italian Olive
Clear Coat - Duplicolor's Matte Wheel Clearcoat from O'Reilly's/Autozone

I'm not suggesting that these are in any way good paints. There are some others I used as well that I'll have to find and post.
I've definitely not had the flexibility in the paint that I was hoping for, but I used rattle cans, which kinda limited my options.

 

[xXDashIVXx]

How bad is your range of movement for your right arm? Looks amazing! Can't wait to see tomorrow's update

 

[WandererTJ]

Thighs - Version 3​

Oh my, totally overlooked this update. But I'm going to make sure to cover it now.

Thighs - Version 1
So these precious darlings helped build up my anxiety that led to my long leave the first time around.
Scaled right, I thought.
These fit nearly perfectly around my thighs, though I would say probably too snug.
It was impossible to get them all the way up to sit where I wanted.

Coming in with undersuit shorts, they did not work at all.

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Thighs - Version 2
Scaled wrong once again in Armorsmith... Too long and too wide even though it looked perfect on my digital avatar/mannequin.
Thankfully I stopped at 1 thigh this time and not two.

Might be interested in selling it though, same with the small ones, and

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This version ended up 4cm too tall, and I can't accept that, so I will go into a version 3 rebuild for the thigh.
This kind of stuff defeated me several years ago prolonging this build, but it's not stopping me now. Round 3: Fight!

Ankle covers are fully scratch. I could see the base shoes I used for the boot and needed to be able to hide them.
When I took this, I still needed to figure out exactly how I wanted them to fasten up. Visible zipper magically attached to the upholstery foam?

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If anyone is looking for thigh armor, I have some for sale! Both the small ones and I wouldn't mind making a matching larger thigh if it would make the sale.

Knee covers will come after completing thighs 3.0.

Thigh - Version 3
Scaled to perfection!
Apologies for the lack of progress pics on these, but when you make the same piece 3 times, you kinda just want to get done.
In the last shot, these are the middle thigh shown.
In the next to last shot, you can see that I actually did some seam filling with caulk.

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Do your best to not let screw ups of yours phase you.
Keep trying.

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How bad is your range of movement for your right arm? Looks amazing! Can't wait to see tomorrow's update

So unbelievably bad.


When you add the torso in, doing even these are impossible. There is no existing "T-Pose" that can be done with this.

 

[WandererTJ]

This is going to be a multi-part update for all the paintingness.
Throughout these, I want to highlight the two-tone paint locations for everything, because every line should replicate the pattern in the game as accurately as possible.

I used a darker grey enamel for the recesses in the CQC and on some of the forearm.
It did NOT bond well with the silver and the blue painter's tape ripped A LOT of it up.
100% recommend using Frog Tape instead, but blue is what I had on hand.

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Paint - Biceps & Shoulder Attachments
(Unweathered)​

This is all Pre-Weathering Paint.
Kinda.
There IS weathering that has already been done, but it was built into the initial painting process by using latex between layers.

Bicep (Left):

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CQC Shoulder with Bicep (Left):
I had tape tear up some paint that I did not want to be torn up. Notably the black. I will go back and touch this up later.
It is my believe that all the black parts should not be weathered, or rather, should be done so in ways where you are not treating it as a metallic part.
I honestly think they are rubbery pieces. So if you want them to be weathered, buff them up a little bit, get them a little brighter, then add some more black that should be darker.

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Commando Shoulder with Bicep (Right):

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Touch Ups:
I really did not like the grey I used for the Commando shoulder, so I mixed some of the silver acrylic I had with some black and brushed on several coats.

​

 

[WandererTJ]

Paint - Forearms
(Unweathered)​

Had A LOT of the grey and the white get torn off from taping them off for the green.
Very unfortunate and frustrating, but wait... This is a Mark V build!
It also helps that you might expect your forearms to get pretty beaten up.
Going to touch all the grey back up before weathering. The white I'm going to live with. It's not TOO bad.
Maybe my character finished the fight with a atmospheric reentry in just the armor and a reentry kit.

Forearms, Painted:

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[WandererTJ]

Paint - Stomach Plate and the Belt/Cod/Tail Plate
(Unweathered)
​

I gotta be honest, I just REALLY want to provide you guys with as many references as possible for these parts.
Here to lift up the community as best as I can.
For those that read my previous posts, the butt plate could be better, but for a first try, I love how it turned out.

The cod piece has a lot of often overlooked recesses. At the top of the grey section it breaks down into a lot of subsections which were honestly difficult to do. The middle of the tri-split section should ideally be recessed more, but mine ended up about even with the others.

Once again, I hate the light grey here and will give it a darker metallic finish.

Stomach Plate:

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Belt/Cod/Tail Plate:

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[WandererTJ]

Note: Post #126 was updated to include Thigh v2 and Thigh v3

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Paint - Leg Armor
(Unweathered)​

Fun fact: I dremel the insides of my foam. Any inside edge/face that is near an opening and might get seen, I take all the material away. I don't want it to be known that it is foam until someone touches it.

Thighs:
Regarding the big silver battle damage:
At one point while doing the detailing, I used the wrong bit with my dremel, and made the recess too wide.
So then I just went at it and roughed it up more, then came back with hot glue in some spots to make it look a little melted.

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Grenadier Knees and Shins:
*ATTENTION* Grenadier Knees should match the primary color, not the secondary color. Painting my knees white was NOT an accident, it was a personal choice, as I strongly think that the color of the knee armor should match shin armor. I'd like to think that this might increase the perception of making your legs longer, but I don't know much about visual trickery. What I do know, is what I like, and I like the knees white

While most of the photos are unweathered, one of the knees was hit with a blackwash before these photos.
It was after that when I thought to myself "I should go take pictures real quick"

So the smokey white look, what caused it?
Well, this is just what it looked like after 1-2 coats of white.
I am sure that a 3rd coat would have left it much more uniformly white, but I liked the look and kept it. Less weathering later!

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Boots:
Reposting these first two pics so you guys can see the process of building up latex on each layer.
You can either peel it off between each color of paint, or build over the previous layer and pull it all of later.

If you compare them to the rest, you might notice I eliminated some of them. I honestly thought I was overdoing it in regards to paint chips, so I just painted over those spots. Thankfully you can't really tell the differentiation in layer thickness that I could have had due to trying to paint over spots with less paint on them.

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[WandererTJ]

Paint - Torso Armor​

Torso progress pics, pre-weathering and clear coat.

Nearly every single piece I've done has gotten a minimum of 5 coats of paint. 1 Silver, 1 Black, and 5 White/3 Green.
I've done this just so that I can achieve a minor weathering effect of paint that has chipped off.
For these surfaces and edges I apply some liquid latex, let it dry, rotate my piece and apply more as necessary.
Between coats I pull all of that work off, and do it again for the next layer.

While the dark grey was sprayed on here, the black and the dark silver were both done by hand.

In the case of the boots, I thought I overweathered them, so when I was applying the latex over the black, there were rips/chips that I intentionally ignored.

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Peeling Up Latex:
Nothing too fancy with this, but wanted a detail shot showing you guys how peeling up latex reveals paint below.

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Spine Plates:
I have yet to really cover these at all, I freehanded them for the most part, using patterns on screen to assist with scaling.
The spine plates have an adapting thickness to them in the in-game models. They are deeply implanted, which made gauging the perfect thickness somewhat difficult, but the standard floor mats seemed to prove adequate.
The lower middle spine plate has a detailed drop in it. The rest of the details were etched in and heated.
Please note that the tips of the side pieces need to be painted to match the secondary color of your armor. It's very minor, but if you're striving for accuracy, you gotta do what you gotta do.

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References:
The first series of photos really help identify where you paint what. The last photo is the indicator of Primary vs Secondary armor color.

Credits: Ruze789, Roadwarrior​

 

[WandererTJ]

Decals Decals Decals!!!​

These were absolutely amazingly fun to do.

I used a combination of the following:
• Semi-Reusable Vinyl Sticker Stencils
• Waterslide Decals on White
• Waterslide Decals on Clear
• Printer Paper cut out for a Hand-Painted Stencil on my Commando Shoulder
• Tape

Warning Labels:
These allowed for a lot of creative freedom, because if you've looked at the suits at much as I have, you know all the warning labels are intentionally unintelligible. You can't read them, but you can come up with your own.
There are a total of 5 of them.

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My Solution:
I like to have a laugh, and for such small decals and writing, I figured people might get close and personal to see what they say, so I did my best to keep them all themed and comical. Perhaps not the best anyone could come up with, but I enjoy them.
Also, as for the Big Caution Triangle, it's probably all in the same language, but I enjoyed putting caution/danger into 3 different languages for the decal.

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Primary Decals (Spartan Number and UNSC):
These proved a little bit of a challenge to get master level accuracy.
I spent a long time attempting to find the perfect military stencil to match. It absolutely doesn't exist.
I'm 90% certain that Bungie came up with their own damn font for this.
Using font searching tools that build results for you, I found the best matches that I could.

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I have to unfortunately be honest with the fact that I forgot which one I used, BUT, what I did was, with the font installed, I opened my preferred picture editing software (GIMP), and wrote and spaced out the UNSC how I wanted. Then I went and broke the letters into appropriate stencil segments to match the versions in game by just using the eraser tool.

Small Caution Triangles:
There are A LOT of little caution triangles. I also almost missed some myself. I also discovered little discrepancies like the colors of the decals per bicep on the MP models. They are different!!!
When I post the finished weathered pictures, be sure to look where the correct placement of these go.
For my height, the triangles were all 0.63" Tall.

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Waterslide Oopsies:
So you've printed out some awesome decals and you're ready to transfer them to your armor, right?
WRONG. Absolutely make sure that you apply at least 3 clear coats to cover the decals, otherwise you'll watch them wash away in front of you.
This can be played with somewhat. especially the clear waterslide paper. There are the caution stripes on the boots that like to move all over the place and cover up details. Due to their transparency, I actually placed them OVER the decals and you can still see them.
Waterslide decals are not the most fun to work with. They also like to peel up after a while. DO be sure to spray clear coats over them to seal them better to the armor. I would say carrying some backups with you if you're going to compete at Outpost is a good idea.

Thankfully, with this guy I had a vinyl stencil as backup which turned out amazing.

ATTENTION: You have my permission to use my custom decals, BUT they are not to be made available for sale or shared to websites outside of the 405th. If you want to share them, link your friends to this post. If you enter in a contest or anyone asks you were you got them, be honest.


If you would like to edit these and come up with your own funny text, you are welcome to.

Lastly, I want to make sure to thank TurboCharizard for printing the vinyl and white-backed waterslides for me.​

 

[Yelsanick0117]

WandererTJ meeting you at Outpost Anaheim and hangin out was a blast, i miss ya man! And Ive already told ya this before, but i was completely blown away by the amount of work and detail you put into your suit. Seeing all these progress pics gives me huge motivation to get my Elite molds done

 

[he4thbar]

Awesome write up my dude. Also much thanks for providing the decals

 

[WandererTJ]

Yelsanick0117 thank you bro. I miss you too, no joke.
I'm glad to be able to provide you and anyone else with motivation.

I regret not documenting my build here as I made it. When I first started off and I was posting, everyone who commented lifted me up and helped me get done what I did at the time.
But my goal was to cut out as many distractions as possible. Time not spent building stressed me out. I had so much to get done, I honestly didn't think I would.
That said, I got it wearable and can always upgrade!

he4thbar thank you my man, and thanks for following along, I see those likes!
The 405th community has been supremely helpful always, and I just want to be able to share as much as I can to uplift everyone still working on Reach/Mark V builds.

 

[Fallen]

Thank you so much for sharing your decals with us. Those will help a lot.
You also have one of the most thorough build logs I've seen, and it's a pleasure to read every update. Great job.

 

[WandererTJ]

Accessory - Smoke Grenades​

What's a Mjolnir Mark V suit without having lots of attachments and accessories?
For starters, let's see what we're working with...

(Fun fact: The "FH" is an Easter Egg, likely one of the developer's initials)​

Oh dear....
Like with the majority of the game files, these aren't usable, but they are useful for coming up with an adequate scale.

3D Model:
I decided I'm going to 3D Model this one myself.
I could have been satisfied with just the shell, but I'm a huge fan of functional props and I wanted this to be able to hold stuff.
So I designed the top so that it could be screwed off.
Rather than designing threads that would be 3D Printed, I decided I would sacrifice some spice bottles to use their threads.

3D Model by: WandererTJ​

The Build:
Here are the 3D Prints and my salvaging the threads off the spice bottles.
I had hoped that these would be able to hold the tiny vodka bottles for the sake of laughs, but when designing them, I discovered they would be about a half inch too long, despite being the perfect diameter. I was not willing to compromise accuracy to accommodate them.
Good news though, they CAN hold little 5 Hour Energy bottles perfectly, which are a food-safe container you can put whatever you want in (if you wanted to).

Thanks to TurboCharizard for 3D Printing these for me.​

Video of them in action can be found here on slide 2:

Spoiler: Instagram Post

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References Used:
While I'm not really fond of using another artist's interpretation for the basis of my work, I heavily based my work on the product from 3A, the 1/6th scale Emile. It seemed much more in line with the details that the game model and texture shared in comparison to the Play Arts Kai version, which is very different.

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Gears of War 5 has presented new assets for our Emile and Kat characters. On Emile's Smoke Grenades in those models, they have pull-pins.
So maybe one day I'll get around to do that version. I was told be sa_roux of 343i that she personally oversaw their creation.

 

[WandererTJ]

Accessory - Magnum​

This is my first BoomCo Mod, Retool, and Repaint that I completed.
A long while back, I came up with a custom color scheme I wanted to use on the M6H that I attempted here. Getting the yellow how I wanted it though proved impossible, so I ended up scrapping it. Eventually, when I get an airbrush, I should be able to achieve it.

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Mod:
The BoomCo Magnums are not very cosplay friendly. They have a "Dart Detector" that keeps the gun cocked with no way to release it without having a dart. It does this to protect from dry-firing which can weaken the power of the gun over time. It simply had to go, and all you have to do for it is pull out a mechanism towards the front on the underside of the barrel.

Retool:
Branding is cool and all, but not when I want my cosplay to look dope, so I took my dremel and grinded away at all of the lettering.
I also wanted sights like the classic magnum, so I added them into the back, also using the Dremel, taking care not to fully penetrate the plastic.
After reassembly, I will add caulking into the recesses for the screws to hide them as best as possible.

Repaint:

You can see in the last photo that the slide can mess up the paint a bit, but I kinda like the weathered look.


I tried to stipple on some yellow, I wanted that faded decal look, but ended up ditching it.​

Almost finished now. Paint is done in these, but I'm going to go back and dremel out a space for a Magnet. Using the bigger ones you can find at Hobby Lobby...which turned out not to be strong enough when walking down stairs or sudden jostles, but I'll try and figure out a better solution for round 2.

Outdoor Photos


Indoor Photos


Magnets!​

This has probably been an example of weathering when less is more. I probably went a little overkill.

 

[xXDashIVXx]

That turned out great, magnets and all! If you haven't played halo 5 alot(I am just throwing this out there because the base coat for the magnum is the same color) there is a shark face bomber skin for the magnum that looks neat. Great job turbo on the modeling as always too

 

[WandererTJ]

xXDashIVXx I model my own props. Turbo only helped me print things.
With the exception of a surprise he sent me, but I haven't covered it yet.

I didn't play a lot of 5, joined the party way late. My old crew are all on PS4 now. I mainly just played enough to get the 1000 GS.